


Exalted because they are useless

by westminsterabi



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, F/F, Femslash, Genderbending, Pining Sherlock, switchlock
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-18
Updated: 2016-11-19
Packaged: 2018-03-31 02:44:40
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 17,069
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3961507
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/westminsterabi/pseuds/westminsterabi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock Holmes and Jane Watson have only been living together for a few months, and are just discovering each other as people and as flatmates. After Sally Donovan makes a suggestive comment, Sherlock begins to realise that she feels something more. Though she may try to deny it, there's no way to avoid simple facts: she, Sherlock Holmes, is falling in love with her flatmate. And nothing in her life has ever been harder. (Not even catching a serial killer). Fem!Sherlock/Fem!John</p><p>(Also technically "toplock" since Sherlock wears a strap-on, but listen...read the scene...Jane is topping)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chemical formulas

**Author's Note:**

> Title comes from Eileen Myles's poem Peanut Butter.

Chemistry was always Sherlock’s favourite subject when she was in school. Everything about it was comforting, simple, yet incredible. She had loved molecular formulas in their logic and structure, had loved taking cool markers or warm chalk in her hand and watching coloured patterns or white lines unfold in front of her face: empirical formulas, electron orbitals, stoichiometry. And then, when she’d finished, there was always a solution in front of her.

 

But _chemistry,_ as in, _you and Jane have such chemistry_ ;that was very different. Nothing about it was comfortable; you couldn’t put it on a cold chalkboard, listening to the click-whoosh-clack-whoosh-whoosh-click of a white piece of chalk against it, and boxing in a number afterwards.

 

Or at least, that’s what Sherlock thought bitterly, fogging the glass on her window with her breath, and drawing a benzene ring with the tip of her index finger. It was late February, and it was sleeting outside. The benzene ring began sweating, little rivulets of water dripping down toward the windowsill. Sherlock blinked. Beyond the window, Baker Street had a kind of bluish pallor to it, like it were dawn and not mid-afternoon.

 

The words kept echoing through her mind, like foreign phrases learned in school that kept running through one’s mind, _have such chemistry, have such chemistry, have such chemistry._ It was Sally who’d said it, about she and Jane having _chemistry,_ but in a kind of mocking way, and the tone carried with the words every time they repeated. Maybe it had been sarcasm. She watched the benzene ring dissolve into droplets and closed the curtain.

 

Inside the flat, the colours were warm, not like the gloomy light outside. Jane was sitting in her armchair, wearing her oatmeal jumper and reading a pulp mystery novel. There was a triangle of orange light on her cheek, from the reading light. She bit her lip, turned the page, and ran a hand through her blonde hair. She seemed to become conscious of being watched, and her eyes flicked up toward Sherlock, then back toward the book.

 

“You know,” said Jane, after what seemed like hours, and still not looking up, “if you want to borrow this book, you can just say. You don’t have to be embarrassed—“ she turned a page. 

 

Sherlock folded her arms and slid down the wall into a seated position. The thump made Jane—who still wasn’t looking at her—flinch.

 

“I don’t want to borrow your book,” she said nastily, “I just want a damn cigarette.”

 

“Suit yourself.”—still not looking!

 

The two of them had only been living together for about two months now, which meant that neither of them bothered smiling in the morning or wishing the other a falsely cheery “have a good day!”, but also that Jane still wasn’t used to Sherlock’s smoking—“I do it out the window, so I don’t understand what your problem is,”; “it’s not about me, I’m a doctor, I can’t just sit and watch you inhale poison”—and Sherlock still wasn’t used to the gambling—basically the same conversation, just vice-versa.

 

Sherlock was still on the floor. There were no cigarettes in the house.

 

The doorbell rang.

 

“Oh thank _god,_ ” Sherlock said, inhaling sharply and rolling her eyes. She leapt to her feet buzzed up the client, not caring that she was still in her pyjamas, with her black hair sticking out of its plait in tufts.

 

“You’re going to see a client like _that?_ ” asked Jane, finally looking at Sherlock, making a pointed once-over from head to toe.

 

That’s another thing Jane didn’t seem to be used to—Sherlock’s not really caring what other people thought, especially if they’d give her cases anyway, which they did. 

 

Sherlock stood and waited with her arms folded, probably the only person in the world who could make five-foot-six look imposing.

 

The knob turned, and Sherlock could tell right away that it was another I-think-my-husband’s-having-an-affair-of-course-he-is type of case, not even worth her time. People expected her to be more sympathetic in that area, as far as private detectives go, by virtue of her being a woman. Of course, that was pure fantasy on their part.

 

“My husband is having an affair,” said the woman.

 

Sherlock collapsed into her armchair. “You didn’t even qualify it, how refreshing. No ‘I think’s,no ‘he’s probably’s _.”_ Jane buried her face in _The Cuckoo’s Calling,_ looking as if she’d like to be about three thousand miles away. Sherlock continued, “Of course he is; now kindly get out of my flat.”

 

Boring. So many of them went that way, thought Sherlock, twisting a piece of curly black hair around her index finger, and fuming. At twenty-six, you’d think she’d have a burgeoning clientele, with good, fascinating cases; that people would be beating down doors to have London’s best consulting detective (oh, fine, _P.I.,_ if you must) working on their cases. Impeccable record. Unrivalled efficiency. Vast resources. But that wasn’t the case.

 

The client had left, swearing and sniffling.

 

“If you’re so bored,” began Jane tentatively, “you could probably ask your—“

 

“ _Fuck_ my brother.”

 

Jane dropped her book and raised her hands in a gesture of surrender. Sherlock remembered when Jane had met her brother, her snivelling, goody-two-shoes, bureaucrat of a brother, on the night of the cabbie case. Mycroft was absurd, good for absolutely nothing but posting bail and handing out interest-free loans. He had too much money for his own good. As far as Sherlock could tell, it hadn’t really been an amicable meeting. Something about kidnapping, strange men in car parks—“to be fair, I was in the army, I could have taken him, easy”—and bribes. Right, fuck Mycroft. Sherlock didn’t need anything from him beyond a bit of help with the rent, and that was really more to mess with his head and pump him for every penny he had, rather than actual need. Sherlock snorted.

 

_You and Jane have such chemistry._

 

It came back, in the quiet moment after all had been said, when they could hear nothing but the roar of the Marylebone Road. _Such chemistry._


	2. Like oxygen atoms

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock has trouble coping with the way she feels about Jane; Mycroft calls her out on a case.

Things didn’t feel quite right at Baker Street after that day, at least not to Sherlock. Maybe it was the words echoing around in her skull, _such chemistry, such chemistry, such chemistry,_ that made her feel as if she and Jane were pieces from two different chemistry model sets that didn’t fit together properly. Maybe it was the dissonance of those words that made everything feel wrong. Or maybe that wasn’t it at all.

 

All Sherlock knew was that something prickled in her throat every time they exchanged a sour look or Sherlock said something that just felt wrong and discordant. She couldn’t really understand it; she never got attached to people, but she absolutely hated this not-fitting-together-properly feeling when it came to Jane.

 

Despite herself, she was attached, and when that realisation came to her in the middle of the night, while she stared at her periodic chart and tried fitfully to fall asleep, she sat up, swallowed, and ran a hand through her hair. There was dim purple light coming from her window, and it couldn’t be any earlier than four in the morning. She squeezed her eyes shut and exhaled through her nose.  

 

She began to do her absolute best to shift her eyes away whenever hers met Jane’s; to smoke when it annoyed Jane the most; to equate the strongest feelings of annoyance and disturbance of her own personal equilibrium to being around Jane. Like Pavlov’s dogs, she reasoned, if she worked herself up every time they talked or saw each other or were in the flat together, she’d really start hating Jane. She could live with hating her.

 

It didn’t work that way. Sherlock would be standing under Lestrade’s umbrella, trying to convince him that he’d got the completely wrong end of the stick about a case whose details she no longer remembered, and her phone would buzz. _Please be Jane,_ she’d think before she could stop herself, and, startled by the thought, she would stop mid-sentence in one of her stream-of-consciousness lectures, and Lestrade would tap her on the shoulder.

 

“Okay, Sherlock?”

 

“Fine,” she’d say; then she’d shiver, and not because of the rain, either.

 

She redoubled her efforts. She stopped inviting Jane on cases, but she came anyway. She started being snippy, stopped smoking altogether so she’d be irritable all the time, and then realised one morning over breakfast that maybe she was sabotaging her own efforts. She was thinking about Jane every minute of every hour, and even if she was trying her best to hate her, that obsession crept into her mind and filled every crevice with thoughts of _her,_ whether they were happy or not.

 

 _Well, shit,_ she thought. She started being nicer.

 

“I’m liking this,” said Jane, looking at the front page of _The Guardian_ five mornings later.

 

“Something interesting?”

 

“No, not at all. I meant your being nice.”

 

Sherlock blinked. “Nice?”

 

“Yeah. Well, as nice as you get, anyway, Sherlock, Sherlock, quite contrary.” The rhyme didn’t work at all, and she made a face into her coffee that said she realised as much. She took a sip and ruffled her hair. Sherlock mirrored her unconsciously. “You’ve been better lately,” Jane continued, “you haven’t been as, well, snippy. Or nasty. Or unkind. I don’t know what I’ve done to earn your approval, but you’d better tell me so I can start doing it more often.” She sounded like she was about half joking.

 

Sherlock didn’t reply, but shoved a piece of bacon into her mouth and chewed.

 

“I’ve got a case on,” she said, taking a swig of her coffee, and sticking her tongue out. “You brewed it weak this morning,” she said disdainfully. Jane just looked at her, her lips partly open as if she was getting ready to say something. She didn’t.

 

Something felt very wrong as Sherlock dashed down the stairs.

 

“You look like something’s taken your attention,” Mycroft said as Sherlock stormed into the Diogenes Club, pursued by a storm of chortles and coughs. “You know,” he said, sipping his brandy thoughtfully, “you never fail to surprise me every time you make it in without getting stopped.”

 

Sherlock rolled her eyes. “Really, the whole concept is so medieval. Like some secret tree house with ‘No girls allowed’ posted up front.” Mycroft opened his mouth to say something, but Sherlock cut him off, “and _don’t_ mention the word ‘ _tradition’_ in whatever you’re about to say, because then I really might lose my composure. I mean, for god’s sake, would it really kill them? Are they afraid I’ll get menstrual blood on the seats?” She smirked when Mycroft’s uncomfortable glance told her he’d rather be anywhere but here, listening to his little sister make jokes about _that_. She chuckled despite herself.

 

Mycroft thought better of whatever reasoning he’d been about to give. “You and Jane getting on?”

 

“Fine, thanks. Now, what did you want me here for?”

 

“Oh, nothing enormously out of the ordinary. Just a fellow named Mr Melas, an interpreter of sorts, with an odd complaint; he’s in the other room…”

 

The case was straightforward. A posting on Craigslist; an answer the next day; an odd cab ride through London, only to find a Greek national gassed to death in an abandoned house with the Mr Melas in question present and still breathing, but just barely. Some stuff about a contract, but Sherlock had a master’s in chemistry. Mycroft was the one with the law degree, and frankly Sherlock didn’t care a whit. The whole business was depressing, was what it was.

 

“There may be an O.B.E. in the deal for you,” said Mycroft in the limousine on the way back to Scotland Yard.

 

Sherlock scowled.

 

“For all I care the queen can go f—“

 

“Sherlock!”

 

-

 

“How was the case?” asked Jane when Sherlock stormed in, still in a foul mood.

 

“Straightforward.” She collapsed in her armchair sideways, with her feet on one armrest and her back on the other.

 

“You say that about them all.”

 

“Well, maybe I mean it.”

 

No one said anything. Sherlock yawned. Finally, Jane asked, “how long has it been since you’ve eaten?”

 

“Dunno,” murmured Sherlock, rubbing her index finger on the space between her eyebrows. Jane snorted.

 

“I don’t know how you’re still alive, honestly. I’m going to order takeaway. Thai. Your favourite.”

 

“Good, fine.” Sherlock waved her hand dismissively, as if she couldn’t care less about what they had for dinner, or even whether she had it. She felt something gush between her legs. “Shit. What’s the date?”

 

“Um,” Jane checked her phone. “The thirteenth.” 

 

Sherlock threw her coat onto the coffee table and waddled over to the bathroom. She was two days early. It was obscene. In a just world, periods would run like clockwork. She freshened up, unwrapped a tampon, changed her underwear, and left the other pair soaking in the sink. Sherlock briefly entertained the idea of calling Mycroft just to torment him, maybe to ask him to have Anthea drop off a box of tampons, but figured that the risk of having to tack an order of chivalry to the end of her name would actually reach a critical level if she did so, and decided against it.

 

She washed her hands, added soap to the knicker soup that was stewing in the sink, and took a look at herself in the mirror. Several dark curls had sprung from her braid and were running wild around her face. She wet her hand and smoothed them down.

 

“I got mine yesterday,” said Jane as Sherlock came out of the bathroom.

 

“Have you got a paracetamol?”

 

“Bathroom cabinet.” Sherlock went back, popped a pill out of its blister pack, and swallowed it dry. She massaged her stomach and tried to ignore the mounting pain. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. _Let’s have period sex,_ she thought, and her eyes flew open with a start. Where had that come from?

 

She made eye contact with herself in the mirror, the only person whose eye she’d ever felt comfortable meeting.

 

“You’re an idiot,” she told herself.


	3. Massive explosions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock does her best to smother her affection for Jane; awful cases abound; Moriarty comes to play.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW for mildly transphobic comment by Jen/Jim. Her views do not in any way represent my own. 
> 
> I am eternally indebted to Ariane De Vere's transcripts for my not having to go back and rewatch The Great Game in order to write this chapter (although, y'know, that might not have been so terrible). Link to the portion I used: http://arianedevere.livejournal.com/45923.html

Sherlock did her best to hide everything. She was good at hiding stuff. She’d successfully hidden her sexuality until the day she’d set foot on the grounds at Newnham College. She’d managed to hide boyfriends, girlfriends, a pair of breasts, and the course she’d applied for at Cambridge, not to mention her chosen career. Her parents still thought she was working at UCL. Mycroft had done her the courtesy of not telling them otherwise.

 

Point was, she thought, rolling onto her side and trying to fall asleep, that hiding the fact that she was quickly falling in love with Jane wouldn’t be that hard. It wouldn’t be difficult at all.

 

“She’s straight,” said Mycroft when he called her the next morning.

 

“Good morning to you, too.” Sherlock shifted the phone to her shoulder and picked a bit of dirt out from under her nail. “And stop prying,” she added as an afterthought.

 

“I think you know as well as I that this is for your own good.”

 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

 

“You’re an abysmal liar.”

 

“I told you not to get involved.”

 

Sherlock hung up. She wasn’t going to cry; she never cried. And yet she could feel something squeezing her chest, and a hollowness rising in her gut, like her intestines were being slowly unravelled. Mycroft knew. Hell, maybe _everyone_ knew. She might as well get a t-shirt made up with “I heart JW” emblazoned on the front.

 

“Stop,” she told herself aloud, and inhaled deeply. _In, out._ It was the one good thing she’d gotten from her two months in rehab. Her psychologist had always told her that whenever she felt anxious or felt like the gears in her brain were jamming, she probably wasn’t breathing deep enough. It actually did help, quite a bit. And it made the emptiness in her stomach subside. _Don’t get involved._ She could hear Mycroft’s voice echoing in the back of her head.

 

“Everything all right?” Jane asked as Sherlock stumbled out of her room that morning.

 

“Why wouldn’t it be?” she asked, not without an edge to the question.

 

“I heard your voice. It sounded like you were talking to your brother.”

 

“How did you know that?” asked Sherlock. She was surprised, if not impressed. She’d spent too long in this business to be impressed.

 

“Your voice only takes on that subtle mixture of frustration and homicidal rage when your brother’s on the line.” Jane took a sip of coffee and smirked.

 

Sherlock should have known it’d be that simple. Good old Jane: rubbish at actual deduction, but she could read people like a book.

 

 _Don’t get involved._ The mantra had started to take on a life of its own, blending with Sherlock’s own voice as if she’d put the thought there herself. It couldn’t be that hard, not getting involved. Could it?

 

-

 

Sherlock kept herself busy. She took every case that came to her doorstep, even the stupid ones. She found missing husbands, tracked down wayward lovers, busted insurance scams, and most of all, stopped thinking about Jane every moment of every day. Even working on mind-numbingly dull cases was better than not working on cases at all, she found out, especially when it came to diverting herself from an obsession.

 

Of course, Jane tagged along sometimes, but it wasn’t quite like those moments of the day when they had nothing to do, when all Sherlock could think about was—no, don’t think about that. They were working in sync, discussing details of the case, airing out the puzzling bits, holding people down while the other punched. There was no time for small talk or big talk or any talk in-between, really.

 

And that was how Sherlock began to try to get over Jane, by cramming every waking moment of every day with people, puzzles, objects, enigmas, books, trinkets, pens, poems, dashes through dark alleyways, and other diversions that left her so utterly exhausted in the evening that when her head collapsed onto her pillow she was barely able to tell herself _I’m falling asleep_ before it was so.

 

She was smothering her deep, dark, secret by giving it no air to breathe.

 

Then came the explosion.

 

Jane had ducked out for the night after a quarrel, and headed for Stephen’s house. Stephen was the flavour of the month right now, and Sherlock liked him, or as much as she could like any man who had explicit permission to kiss Jane on a regular basis.

 

Gas leak, they said. That was rubbish.

 

Moriarty, Sherlock said. That, it would later emerge, was true.

 

The next morning Jane hurried back after she heard the news only to find Mycroft Holmes in their sitting room, and Sherlock scowling and plucking her violin.

 

The following week was more than Sherlock could have hoped for. Nothing ever stopped, not even for them to sleep. Shoes were found, things blew up, people died, guns went off, people were saved, USB drives were retrieved, criminals were caught, and everything seemed to be rolling on faster and faster and faster and Sherlock was thriving on it until it all caught her by the throat and jerked her back because then, suddenly and without warning, Jane was put in harm’s way. 

 

When she saw Jane strapped with explosives, with the whole place about to go up, Sherlock’s breath was gone from her and she felt like someone had punched her straight in the stomach, knocked her wind out, leaving her cold and struggling for air. The whole world seemed to be shrinking, sucking into one point, freezing and twitching in phases. She felt diminutive, small, insignificant in the face of whoever this Moriarty was, this Moriarty who had found her pressure point, but she couldn’t let it show.

 

“I gave you my number…” the voice was female, and familiar. No, not—“I thought you might call.” Not Jen from IT. How could she have been so stupid? Sherlock flicked back through her memories, watching her blunders, her stupidity, and her ignorance behind closed eyelids, and not being able to do anything about it.

 

“Is that a British Army Browning L9A1 in your pocket, or have you been hiding something?”

 

Sherlock rolled her eyes. “It couldn’t be both, could it?” she asked, pulling out the weapon and sticking it in Moriarty’s face.

 

“Jen Moriarty. Hi!” _Irish, interesting,_ thought Sherlock, filing away the information for later analysis. But her attention jerked back to Jane so quickly that it practically gave her whiplash.

 

“Jen? Jen from the hospital?”

 

Sherlock could feel the muscles in her neck tense up, and she cursed herself, all while keeping the gun trained on Moriarty. A laser sight flickered over Jane’s chest, and Sherlock watched it, puzzled.

 

“Someone else is holding the rifle, of course. Don’t like to get my hands dirty.” She paused and loped gracefully along the edge of the pool. “I’ve just given you a little preview of everything that I’ve got going on out there. I’m a consultant, you see, making my way along in this men’s world. Just like you!”

 

“A consulting criminal. Brilliant.”

 

“Isn’t it? No one ever gets to me. And no one ever will.”

 

Sherlock cracked a wide smile. “Well, no one but me.”

 

“You’ve come the closest. Now you’re getting in my way.”

 

Sherlock’s hands wanted so badly to shake, but she held them steady. “Thank you.”

 

“That wasn’t a compliment.”

 

“Yes it was.”

 

“Okay, it was.” Jen’s eyes narrowed. “But the flirting’s over, now. Mommy’s had enough! I showed you all those problems I solved, all those people I helped. I nearly threw away millions of pounds just to tempt you out of your hole. So just…” she paused thoughtfully. “…take this as a warning, darling. Back off.’

 

“But I really did enjoy playing games with you. Being Jen from IT. Playing the dyke.”

 

“People have died.”

 

“That,” said Jen softly, closing her violet eyelids, “is _what people do._ ”

 

“I’m going to stop you,” said Sherlock, with triumph in her voice.

 

“No you’re not.”

 

Sherlock exhaled, and the gravity of the situation came back to her like a bludgeon. She looked back and Jane, still stinging from the sight of her decked out in explosives. “Are you all right?”

 

“You can talk, Jane, honey,” said Jen.

 

Jane’s dark blue eyes met Sherlock’s, and she looked obstinate. Sherlock proffered the USB drive. “Take it.”

 

“The missile plans!” exclaimed Jen with delight. Then she paused. “Boring. Could have got them anywhere.” She grabbed the USB drive from Sherlock’s hand and crushed it beneath a thick heel. Jane looked ready to lunge, and when Moriarty turned her back to pace along the pool again, she took her chance, grappling with the taller woman.

 

“Run!” she shrieked.

 

“Oh, this makes me so happy,” said Jen with a chuckle. “But what happens if…?”

 

And Sherlock heard Jane gasp and knew that there must be a laser sight trained on her own head now.

 

“Got you!” said Jen. She brushed off her suit coat with her hands and looked like her very dignity had been damaged. “Ugh. Westwood,” she commented, gesturing to her suit, which Sherlock noticed for the first time was quite impeccably tailored.

 

“Well, as a fellow pantsuit aficionado, I’ll keep her in mind the next time I buy you a gift. Or maybe my next gift could just be a bullet in the head.” Her hands were really shaking now, and she could feel a shot of epinephrine course through her veins at every little sound.

 

“Well, my own gift to you would be the look of surprise on my face. Because I would be surprised. I don’t think you quite have the balls.”

 

Sherlock scoffed.

 

“Of course, you wouldn’t get to enjoy it for very long. Au revoir, Sherlock Holmes.” She walked nonchalantly towards the door, looking as if she had not a care in the world.

 

“Catch you later.”

 

“No you won’t!”

 

Sherlock’s hands finally gave out, and she let the pistol drop to the floor, dropping to her knees and trying to undo the vest with trembling fingers, wondering if maybe now was the time to say it, _I love you, Dr Jane Watson,_ but no, instead—“are you alright?”

 

“Yeah.” Jane breathed heavily. “Yeah, I’m fine. I’m okay. Or, I’ll be okay.”

 

Sherlock threw the explosives, which slid across the floor. Jane started quivering, but remained upright. Her hands didn’t seem to be working properly, either, because she tried three times to take the earpiece out but couldn’t seem to get a firm grip on it. Finally, she got it out, and her knees buckled, thick shivers rippling across her body.

 

“Jesus fuck,” Jane breathed. “Are you—are _you_ alright?”

 

“Me? Yes. Fine. Fine. I’m fine. That, er…well, that thing that you did…what you offered to, uh, do…well. That was, uh, good.”

 

“Well, just hope that no one saw that.”

 

“Saw what?”

 

“You, ripping my clothes off in a darkened swimming pool. People might talk.”

 

The words were like a second blow to the chest, but Sherlock didn’t let on. “People do little else.” She started scratching her head with the pistol, but Jane elected not to say anything. After all, they’d just survived a situation that was in all probability much deadlier than scratching one’s head with the barrel of a loaded semiautomatic pistol with the safety off. Actually, on second thought—

 

Shit.

 

“Oh god. Oh god.” There was another laser sight jumping around on her chest.

 

They heard the voice before they saw the woman. “Sorry, girls! I’m soooooo changeable!”

 

The lasers travelled up and down Sherlock’s body while she tried frantically to count how many there were. Too many, and they were moving too fast—

 

“It is a weakness with me, but to be fair, it is my _only_ weakness. Sorry, but you ladies simply can’t be allowed to continue. I would try to convince you but, well, everything I have to say has already crossed your mind!”

 

Sherlock squeezed her eyes shut, but opened them again just as quickly, thinking that there had to be some way out of here, something that she wasn’t seeing, something Jen didn’t see either, there had to be something. All thoughts of Jane, all thoughts of confessing, had been blown from her mind. All she cared about now was getting out of this, living to see tomorrow, and _then,_ maybe then...

 

Jane’s eyes were bursting with all the emotions she couldn’t let out. Sherlock’s own met them, and for the first time, they felt like home. Jane looked back, and Sherlock knew that she had to try.

 

“Then probably my answer has crossed yours,” she said definitively, hoping, praying to whatever gods she didn’t believe in, that this would work. It had to. Please. She trained the gun on Jen, and looked at Jane one last time, just in case it really was the last. Then, slowly but steadily, without her hands shaking at all, she lowered it toward the explosives.


	4. Reaction times

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock and Jane return from the pool; Sherlock sleeps alone. Maybe.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fluff fluff fluff fluffy fluff fluff

It was odd to think that even at the end of the most delirious, surreal, exhausting days, one always had to go to bed. That’s what Sherlock thought as she slowly unbuttoned her shirt and undid the clasp of her trousers after the long tube ride back to Baker Street. Her hands were still shaking with adrenaline, or maybe it was the aftershock: her body trying to recuperate from the ordeal. She forced herself to take several deep breaths, threw her crumpled shirt at the foot of her bed, and collapsed onto her pillow wearing only a bra and a pair of pants.

 

Her body was wracked with shaking that had nothing to do with emotion and everything to do with shock and absolute horror at how badly she had failed. It was only luck that had saved them, in the end. For as brilliant as she was, she had miscalculated. She had put both Jane and herself in the firing line, and had it not been for one little coincidence, one little phone call, they’d both be so much ash at the bottom of a pool.

 

Everything had gone cold in her extremities. She could barely feel her toes, and her skin was frigid to the touch. Sherlock pulled her duvet over hear head and wrapped it around herself like a cocoon, thinking of Jane in the other room, and how lost and helpless and betrayed she must feel. She tried to tell herself that they were alive, and that was what mattered. She’d spent too much time calling bollocks on positive affirmations for it to work.

 

And then she heard breathing. It was dark in the room, so she couldn’t see anything but the glint of someone’s iris. It had to be either a burglar or—

 

“Sherlock?”

 

Jane sounded frightened; there was something in her voice that smacked of a primary-schooler calling for her mother in the middle of the night to chase away monsters. Sherlock flicked on her bedside light. Jane was standing there, wrapped in her covers and wearing a jumper that went almost all the way down to her knees. For a twenty-seven year-old she looked surprisingly young.

 

“Sorry, maybe I’m bothering you. I just—I couldn’t fall asleep. I was shaking too hard. I was wondering if I could just—“ she couldn’t quite get the words out.

 

“Yes, of course.”

 

“I promise I won’t steal your covers.”

 

Outside, Sherlock could hear it starting to rain gently, washing away the shame and the terror of that night. It had to be past three in the morning. Jane dropped her own covers on the floor, lifted up Sherlock’s duvet and slid herself in. Sherlock flicked the light back off.

 

In the dark, she could hear Jane’s breathing and heartbeat, and the rain pattering on the roof. It was going harder now, not just drizzling. Thump-whoosh-thump-thump-whoosh-thump-whoosh-thump-thump-whoosh. Her hand bumped against Jane’s and she could feel her pulse.

 

“Are you asleep?” whispered Jane.

 

Sherlock paused for a moment. “No,” she said finally.

 

“Good,” said Jane, lacing her fingers around Sherlock’s. She scooted a bit closer so that their legs were touching. “I just need someone to touch,” she said. Sherlock wondered if Jane could hear her own heart thundering. _It’s just chemistry,_ Sherlock told herself, _just a rush of oxytocin, and endorphins, and other hormones trying to trick you._ The steady beating of Jane’s heart was still comforting, and along with the rain, it slowly lulled Sherlock to sleep.

 

-

 

When she woke up the next morning, she was temporarily confused by the presence of an extra warm body in her bed, but when she saw the mop of short blonde hair on the pillow next to her, she felt a flush of warmth and then realised with embarrassment that she’d slept next to Jane for—what time was it?—for seven hours, in nothing but a bra and knickers. But Jane was still sleeping, and probably hadn’t noticed. It had been dark, after all.

 

Sherlock reached one trembling hand out to Jane’s head, and touched her hair gently. It was soft, like down.

 

Jane groaned.

 

“Ohhhhhhhhh.” She rolled over, practically onto Sherlock, who jerked her hand away, shocked at what she’d done. “That was,” she inhaled deeply and stretched her limbs out, tensing her muscles and releasing them, “…so nice.”

 

Sherlock blinked. Jane turned her head towards Sherlock.

 

“It’s just really pleasant to have another person in your bed, you know? I used to hate it, back when they made Harry and me share a bed at our aunt’s house, but even since uni, and the army, I’ve kind of missed it. It’s not quite the same, after sex.”

 

Sherlock realised that Jane probably wasn’t addressing her directly, but replied anyway, “I’ve never shared a bed with anyone.”

 

“Never?”

 

“Well, not that I can remember. Mycroft was much older. By the time I was out of a cot, he was old enough to complain about sharing a bed. And then, with sex, well…” she trailed off, then started again. “Usually, you know, they’d just leave.” She turned red at this startlingly personal confession, sat up, and started picking at the threads on her pillow while staring out the window. It was London at ten o’clock on a Tuesday, and the morning commute was just dying down.

 

She hated to talk about it, but the two times she’d had sex with a man, she’d appointed herself master of the floor and claimed that she had to wake up early for work and didn’t want to disturb him. Really, she just hated sharing with men. She’d been nineteen, both times.

 

Then she realised that there was something she hadn’t said. She swallowed. “I’m—I’m so sorry about last night. I, I didn’t realise that things would, um, turn out that way, and I really just wanted to say…I’m sorry. For every—“ Jane held up her hand.

 

“I don’t need an apology, Sherlock.” Her voice was tense, and Sherlock’s heart leapt into her throat. What did that mean? “There’s nothing to say you’re sorry for.”

 

Sherlock swallowed. Did she really mean it? Her face was unreadable like, admittedly, most faces Sherlock had encountered. But she chose to take it for sincerity. She flopped back down onto the bed and said, “If anything had happened to you, I probably would never have been able to forgive myself.”

 

“Sherlock whose-middle-name-I-don’t-know Holmes, you’re forgetting that nothing did. There isn’t anything to forgive.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope no one is left too sexually frustrated.


	5. Dynamic equilibrium

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock remembers how she got addicted.

For months after they’d slept in the same bed, Sherlock would reach out for Jane in the middle of the night and, not finding her there, would fall back into a fitful sleep and wake up in the dawn light with her arms outstretched. She began behaving like a widow or divorcee, stuffing the right side of the bed with pillows and pretending that that it was _someone_ next to her. It was mad, how quickly she’d gotten addicted.

 

She found herself eyeing dealers on the tube, frequenting unsavoury parts of London, until something jerked her back and she asked herself what she was doing and what Jane would say if she found out.

 

 _What the_ fuck _, Sherlock? What the_ actual fuck _? What is this?_

_I can’t believe you didn’t say something._

_I can’t believe you’ve betrayed me like this._

_I can’t believe you got into this shit again._

Mostly, disbelief, Sherlock though every time she ran through the conversation in her head. Jane wouldn’t be able to believe it. She’d be disappointed, not for the first time in their relationship, but certainly for the worst. Sherlock remembered the look on Jane’s face when she’d first learned Sherlock had been involved in _that._

 

 _No. You? Seriously?_ She’d been so unwilling to believe; she’d looked so betrayed when she found out. Sometimes Sherlock herself couldn’t believe it. Everything had seemed so good at first. Top marks at college, chemistry at Newnham, firsts all three years. And then everything had gone so black, so wrong—how could things have been that wrong, at twenty-one?

 

It was like everything was fine at one moment, or at least wasn’t terrible, and then she was set on a downward trajectory; the stress of earning her third first had been a little much, and Victoria had ended it with her, but neither of those things were really _it. It_ was more like an illness or numbness crawling over her skin, strangling her mornings and evenings and slowly creeping into and invading the rest of the day.

 

She had no friends without Victoria, no one to talk to, so when those shadows started coaxing her and told her that she was worthless shit, that she didn’t deserve to live, that life was pointless anyway and she was just a bundle of carbon atoms trying to resist entropy, she couldn’t tell anyone. The shame was too much.

 

Her momentum carried her until the very end of term, and her marks never wavered, but she was still suffocating every moment of every day and couldn’t get herself to care. She cared less and less about her degree, about going on for her masters, about going on with life. Everything that she was had slowly dwindled away bit by bit so that it was unnoticeable from day to day but she had realised as she packed up her things in June that she felt so terribly empty inside and had no idea where that feeling had come from. When Victoria had stopped by one weekend in April, Sherlock had snapped and started screaming at her to get out. She’d never had many friends, but even the ones she had were starting to stay away, leaving her cold, scared, and alone.

 

She’d been crashing down, and when she’d got her hands on a dose of palladone that had been the first step. She’d gone crashing, whirling out of control, hurtling along through the darkness, but a different kind of darkness than the one before, a numb kind of darkness that made her not want to think about anything, rather than thinking too much like she had before. This kind of darkness was greyness, not blackness, and that was comforting. It was better than being lost in a permanent night.

 

She made shady deals in dark alleyways, sometimes, when she was desperate, but normally she just went to one bloke. He was a normal-looking man, not at all the seedy type, but not the kind of person Sherlock ever would have mixed with back at Cambridge, either. He’d always seemed genuinely sorry for her, as she showed up each time at his flat skinnier and skinnier, looking more and more tired.

 

She’d gotten a research job at Imperial back when she could bring herself to care about something, _anything_ , but she quit it as soon as she could. The money wasn’t a problem. It was just about keeping herself occupied, and the drugs took care of that. They took care of everything else, too, and eventually she started waking up with numb hands or getting the chills on the tube and she realised that all her body fat was gone and there was nothing protecting her from the world anymore. She wrapped her coat around herself even on the warmest of days and started wearing padding under her clothes every time she visited home, hoping foolishly that no one would notice her face was thinning out and she’d started looking wan.

 

Then Mycroft had found out. She still didn’t know exactly how, but her bossy big brother had found out about her drug habit and spoken to their parents and then there had been intake forms and family discussions and whispered conversations in corridors until she hadn’t been able to take it anymore. She escaped. They found her. They put her back in, and this time she stayed, for six whole months with a therapist and fluoxetine and methadone and, somehow, the light had come swimming back. But it had been so fake, just brain chemistry.

 

After she was released, she’d started her master’s back at Imperial and things had gotten a bit brighter. She had work, not work like she preferred, but at least something to do, a lab coat to put on three times a week, pens worn to the contours of her hand; she had something to grip onto when she felt like she was falling back into that damn abyss. After she’d finished that up, she’d opened up practice and started really doing what she loved.

 

What would Jane say, if she knew the whole story? Would she be sympathetic? Would she care? Or would she just be angry that Sherlock’s self-control had failed again, that she was tumbling down again and picking up momentum?

 

She was on the tube, and if she wanted, she could pull aside that kid from Poplar, right now, and offer to buy whatever he was selling—palladone or heroin, Sherlock couldn’t tell from this distance. She could have it in five minutes, have a needle in her arm in ten, and that rush would be hers. Just ten minutes away.

 

They called Barbican, and Sherlock’s resolve strengthened. She’d do it now, just the once. Just one hit, she’d feel the rush and the relief and the feeling of soaring, and then she’d drop it and go sober again. Her eyes glazed over as she thought about doing it. She stood up and started to get off after the boy.

 

Her phone rang.

 

“You never do it just once,” said Jane.

 

Sherlock’s heart started thundering and she could feel the blood pounding in her ears. _She knew._ How could she know? _How could she possibly know?_

 

“What?”

 

“No, don’t pretend you don’t know what I’m talking about. _Milk goes bad_ if you leave it out, Sherlock. And you never do it just the once, either. You leave the same box out three or four times, and it smells something awful. Do I need to leave a note on the fridge?”

 

Sherlock had stepped out onto the platform and stood there, frozen, holding her phone, while Jane chattered away about milk.

 

When Jane hung up and her hands started trembling, worse than they had after the pool, Sherlock realised that her worst fear wasn’t dying, but rather losing Jane.


	6. Catalysts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock starts having problems functioning.

Nothing after that day seemed right. Sherlock found herself zoning out on the tube and pushing a pair of earbuds in. Normally she hated earbuds, and only had a pair because they came with her phone; on the tube, she always listened to the conversations people were having around her: the elderly American tourists wearing union jack t-shirts and talking about gastric bypass; the German businessmen chattering away on their phones; the Irish uni boys’ drunk laughter filling up the carriage.

 

After that day though, the world wasn’t comforting or interesting. It was bleeding into her headspace, invading the barrier between the world of her mind, and the banal world outside, and that wasn’t something she could bear. So she stuck in a pair of earbuds, like every other twentysomething on the tube, bobbing their heads away to The Kooks or the Arctic Monkeys or Bastille or Jamie T. It made her feel so terribly banal, but every noise and every word she heard on the Circle Line bounced around her skull and made it so she couldn’t concentrate on anything for hours, and she couldn’t have that, even more than she couldn’t have a constant stream of distraction plugged into her ears.

 

The world seemed fragmentary. She would miss words and conversations and Jane leaving the flat. She would stare into space for hours on end, and listen for the traffic for the entire night while she struggled and failed to fall asleep. She would sleep through the day. Lestrade would ring and she’d answer and she’d take the tube to Scotland Yard and solve a case and then lapse back into that empty sensation in which everything was cracking down the middle and none of the edges seemed to match when she tried to put it back together.

 

Was she lovesick? It seemed impossible.

 

She practically stopped eating, and once collapsed in the middle of a case to feel Jane’s cool hand slapping her face gently and saying “Sherlock, wake up. Sherlock, _wake up._ ”

 

Jane insisted they go to a GP right then and there, and stop trying to figure out who stole sixteen diamonds from a safety deposit box in the Strand.

 

“But seven hundred thousand pounds, Jane!”

 

“Shut up, you clot.” It was not an affectionate insult, like most of them were. It was filled with anger and frustration and worry. Jane’s blonde eyebrows were knitted together and a flush was creeping up her neck. As much as it annoyed her to have Jane telling her what to do, it did remind Sherlock of why she was in love with Jane—insofar as one can really ascertain the cause of love. Jane cared. Jane understood people; she had a kind of intelligence that had always and would always elude Sherlock. She found a way to cram an incredible amount of love and affection into her 5’2” frame. She had more of it in one strand of hair than Sherlock had in her whole body.

 

But what was really special about Jane was that none of this made her weak. In fact, she was stronger than anyone Sherlock knew. She was willing to stand up to people, to tell Mycroft to fuck off because she believed in what was right and had a beautiful moral compass that paired so immaculately with her warmth and kindness, and yet could never override it. Which was why she was dragging Sherlock along the Thames to the Temple tube station: as much as she cared about catching criminals and doing the right thing, she cared about Sherlock more.

 

-

 

“As I expected,” said Jane, after the blood tests got back. “Your haemoglobin is one-hundred per-cent, completely, utterly, in the toilet. Even if you don’t eat, you absolute berk, you need to start taking iron supplements or else this is going to start happening more often. You _menstruate,_ Sherlock. You lose iron on a regular basis although frankly I would _not_ be surprised if that stopped altogether, with the state you’re in.”

 

They were back on the flat, and Sherlock was lying on the sofa on her back at Jane’s insistence, with an ice pack on her face. Jane was pacing in front of her with the printout in her right hand, running her left through her hair. Her eyebrows were still frighteningly close together.

 

“You’re an idiot. I honestly cannot believe how stupid you are. You’re staying home for a week.”

 

Sherlock rolled her eyes. “You can’t just—“

 

“I can. I’m your doctor. And if you sneak out, I’m calling your brother.” Her expression softened. “You—you clot.” She sat down on her chair and crossed her legs. Sherlock could hear a sob creeping up Jane’s throat. “I—“ she rubbed her eye with the sleeve of her jumper, “I was so worried about you, you dummy. When you keeled over like that I didn’t know what was wrong, something could have been seriously bad.” She choked back another sob. “You saved my life, Sherlock. You saved my life and I honestly don’t know what the fuck I would have done if—“ her face was wet now “—if it hadn’t just been something as dumb as iron deficiency. _Iron deficiency,_ Sherlock, and look at me, I’m an absolute mess.”

 

Sherlock stayed on the sofa, dumbstruck, and when she tried to sit up, Jane wailed.

 

“Stay there!” She wiped off the last of her tears, stood up, and walked over to the couch. It was midday, and the sun was streaming into the windows in light yellow bands. The dust motes swirled through the air, and Sherlock watched them so intently that she didn’t notice Jane bending down until the moment their lips met.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ;)


	7. Chirality

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Just read it, okay?

Jane caught Sherlock with her eyes open, and the incongruity of the whole situation caught Sherlock off-guard. One moment, yelling and tears and anger; her staring at the dust in the air and trying to hold it together. The next, a soft pair of lips against her own. Her entire body was quivering and it was like someone had run a thin wire up her spine. Everything was tingling and shaking and she could feel a rush of every good chemical and every good feeling spreading through her body.

 

She closed her eyes, pushed against Jane, and grabbed her hair, almost violently. It was as soft as she remembered from that one morning, months ago. Sherlock felt a kind of warm wetness between her legs and every breath ran through her ribs like fire. Every moment was like a freeze frame, like each second was being stopped and preserved in amber before they moved on to the next. It should have been moving quickly, but the whole moment was moving so very slowly, like molasses. Sherlock felt a kind of lightness or warmth spreading through her shoulders and across her chest. Every muscle lost its tenseness.

 

But Jane was still bent in what seemed like an uncomfortable position over the couch. Sherlock wrenched her mouth away with great effort, opened her eyes, and they looked at each other, chests heaving. Jane was kneeling in front of the couch. Sherlock was half sitting up, propped up on one elbow.

 

“I thought—I thought you were kissing me back,” said Jane, her expression unreadable.

 

Sherlock was silent.

 

“I _was_ kissing you back.” They both blinked. “I thought you seemed uncomfortable. It’s a hard floor.” She swallowed. “Maybe…maybe the bedroom?”

 

Jane exhaled sharply, stood up, and practically sprinted to the staircase, taking the stairs two at a time. Sherlock stood up and threw the ice back to the side, hobbling over to the stairs and climbing them cautiously, one by one. Jane was sitting on her own bed, panting, and missing her pants.

 

“I’m sorry, I forgot.” She looked down at herself, as if realising for the first time that she was naked from the waist down. She tugged nervously on her jumper.

 

“S’all right,” said Sherlock, standing on the threshold and surveying the room, unsure of what to do next.

 

“Shut up,” said Jane, standing up and walking over to Sherlock.

 

Their mouths met violently and suddenly this time, and Jane wasted no time before breaching Sherlock’s lips her with tongue. Jane’s hands fumbled around Sherlock’s shirt collar, because she still hadn’t opened her eyes, and she began running her hands down Sherlock’s clavicle blindly, searching for the top button. When she found it, she undid it in a quick, sharp motion, almost tearing it off.

 

“Careful!” muttered Sherlock as well as she could. Her hands were otherwise occupied caressing Jane’s neck and stroking her hair in broad motions.

 

Jane undid the next buttons quickly, and Sherlock obliged her by pulling her hands away and wriggling out of the dark blue shirt. They broke their kiss for a minute, and Jane threw Sherlock’s shirt into a faraway corner. Looking into Jane’s eyes, Sherlock felt suddenly shy, but Jane forged ahead, undoing the clasp of Sherlock’s bra and sliding the straps gently down her arms, all while looking at her face.

 

They hadn’t said a word; Sherlock hadn’t said anything about the tingling that was still running down her spine and the wordless ecstasy that was blossoming in her brain like fireworks, or the very rational and beautiful and logical happiness that she was feeling as a certain part of her screamed _she loves you back_ and another argued back that _that’s not what this means._

That lovely, logical euphoria was so far from the chaotic and vicious hunger that was crawling up her throat she pulled Jane’s thick wool jumper over her head while Jane obligingly held her arms up, as she balled it up and threw it aside and started on Jane’s bra, as Jane tossed Sherlock’s bra aside too, fell to her knees with the clasp of her own half-undone, seized Sherlock’s trousers and pulled them down in one fluid motion.

 

“Is this okay?” she asked, looking from Sherlock’s pants up into her face, which was staring, mesmerized, at Jane’s lips. Was she dreaming?

 

“Yes.”

 

Jane seized Sherlock’s knickers with two hands and pulled those down, too, baring the flesh and the curly brown ringlets between them.

 

“On the bed…” Sherlock protested, but they didn’t make it that far. She lowered herself to the floor gingerly and lay supine. Jane’s head disappeared between her legs, and she felt a gentle insistence, a sort of probing. She closed her eyes and shivered, her arms lying slack at her side. Jane continued to work, and Sherlock raised one of her hands to Jane’s hair and grasped it, feeling that gentle insistence and pressure. She could feel something building in her chest and belly.

 

Jane kept going, without looking up into Sherlock’s face. She stopped abruptly and her face emerged.  She wiped her lips with the back of her hand and then silently slid her left hand into Sherlock, moving it back and forth rhythmically and grasping and pushing in ways Sherlock had never felt or tried before. That feeling kept coming, Jane kept pushing with that enigmatic look on her face, and neither of them made a noise apart from breathing and sighing. Sherlock’s hips started jerking and everything in the room blurred as she closed her eyes and waited.

 

Suddenly she gasped and nearly cried out; it was like she was being shattered into pieces, like her body wasn’t real anymore, and she was floating. Her hips started moving back and forth. Jane paused to take her bra off completely, and slid up Sherlock’s body so their breasts were flush with each other. Jane’s finger circled Sherlock’s nipple, but she stopped after a moment and pressed their mouths together again. Sherlock reached her hand down between Jane’s legs and began pumping and stroking. She felt Jane quiver. Jane let her hand fall from Sherlock’s chest to her side.

 

Jane grunted, and Sherlock’s hand moved faster, rapid back and forth, almost like vibrato. She kept at it, trying to stroke Jane like Jane had stroked her, pressing, caressing, using two fingers or three fingers and pushing with more and more insistence. She felt Jane tightening and opening, thrusting and gyrating her hips to give Sherlock a little more help. They were still kissing, but it was an awkward position, and Jane paused for a moment to grab Sherlock’s hand and guide it northward. Sherlock kept rubbing. Jane took her hand from Sherlock’s wrist and started gently stroking Sherlock’s breasts again.

 

Jane stopped moving her hips, inhaled deeply, and then sighed. Sherlock moved her hand away, opened her eyes, and gave Jane one last peck on the lips. They lay there on the floor, and scooted closer so their breasts pressed against each other, and they stared into each other’s eyes.

 

“Bed,” said Sherlock.

 

“Okay,” said Jane, and she picked herself up, not protecting or shielding herself, totally at ease, and collapsed back down on the bed. Sherlock followed suit, but covered her breasts awkwardly with one arm while she navigated the piles of clothes.

 

“We just had sex on the floor,” said Sherlock.

 

They were lying on their sides like mirror images, still looking at each other, and barely touching.

 

“Next time, we’ll try and make it to the bed,” said Jane.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A big thank you to Sarah Waters, without whose indirect mentorship I would never have been able to write a halfway decent sex scene.
> 
> Edit: this chapter was edited in response to a friend whose only reaction to it was "they both came real quick". I <3 you and your feedback :)


	8. Solubility rules

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After sex, the residents of Baker Street need to talk about what comes next.

They fell asleep next to each other, even though it was midday. When they woke up simultaneously, naked and in the same bed, they stared at each other and started grappling with the reality of the fact that they’d actually had sex.

 

“We—“ Sherlock swallowed.

 

“Yeah,” said Jane.

 

“I—I love you,” said Sherlock.

 

“I know, you numpty.” Jane was grinning. “We should probably put something on.”

 

“No, I like us like this.”

 

“I have work.”

 

“Okay.”

 

“You can sleep if you like.” Sherlock stroked Jane’s arm while she said it.

 

“Okay.”

 

Sherlock closed her eyes and marvelled in her own happiness. All desire to plunge back into that heroin-induced slumber had gone, and her entire body was warm and soft and everything felt so right. She felt Jane roll off the bed wordlessly, and listened to her open a drawer, and felt her feet pad out of the room. Slumber slowly began caressing and rocking her, and she surrendered, hoping that Jane would be back by the time she woke up.

 

Jane wasn’t back, but when Sherlock wrapped herself in her dressing gown and went down to her room to get her laptop to check her blog, to see if there were any cases to distract herself with, she found a receipt with a note scrawled on the back.

 

_to sherlock:_

_we can talk when I get back_

_jane_

Sherlock smoothed out the creases, folded it gently, and put it in the pocket of her dressing gown. It was September and unseasonably warm, but she was still so skinny that going outside made her shiver. She went back up to Jane’s room and pulled on the knickers and trousers from the last day, tried her best to smooth the wrinkles out of the shirt, and buttoned it up without bothering to tuck it. She grabbed her keys, put on her coat, and stumbled down the steps toward the street.

 

Outside, London was of course the same. The lives of seven million people had not been changed by Sherlock Holmes’s first time having sex with someone she really and truly loved. It was overcast and grey and people were talking on their mobiles or driving down the street or hailing cabs as if the world hadn’t shifted or broken in two. Even though she still felt depression tugging at her it didn’t have nearly as much of a hold.

 

Everyone was oblivious to the dark-haired lesbian standing in front of 221, marvelling at the beauty of the city for the first time, really. She started walking north towards the Marylebone Road, with the breeze ruffling her coat and unkempt hair. She was wandering aimlessly, her brain cranking away and trying to rub away the pessimism that still nagged at her. She turned west, toward Kensington.

 

 _Just because she had sex with you doesn’t mean she loves you._ Every synapse seemed to be contradicting the next, firing in different directions, _she loves me she loves me not she had sex with me she was just horny she didn’t say she loved me back she just said ‘I know’ doesn’t ‘we can talk when I get back’ bode poorly—_

She lost herself grinding her brogues into the pavement; normally she hated walking aimlessly, it felt pointless, like a waste of energy. But she hadn’t been behaving normally at all the last few months. _Isn’t that what love does?_ It bends you out of shape, stops you from feeling normally, screws up your brain chemistry and your habits and everything that anchors you properly to the world at large and you’re floating off like a lost balloon. Unattached. Gone. Flying to god knows where. She felt ill.

 

The taller buildings of central London gave way to the lower buildings of the west and she watched a bus streak by, headed for Euston Square. It started drizzling, and the road turned into a motorway, but she kept moving, knowing exactly where she was but unsure of where she was going. Eventually the roads and the bus routes and the tube stops stopped making sense and it started pouring so she ducked into a Prêt à Manger to wait it out.

 

Her phone rang while she watched the pulse of teenagers and uni kids going in and out, young Londoners still full of possibility. There were fourteen hiding bellybutton piercings, two with secret tattoos, fifteen queer kids of varying depth in the closet, six who were failing higher maths, two failing English, one who’d skived off two lessons, three who’d skived the entire day, and a few kids who’d just gotten their A-levels in June. She was bored, just deducing to keep herself busy.

 

The rain cleared up, so she left and started walking again. The tide of the city had started to rise again as kids rode home from school, parents picked them up, and some adults were even coming home from work.

Her phone rang.

 

“Where are you?”

 

“Somewhere in Holland Park.”

 

“ _Somewhere?”_

 

“Hm?”

 

“Well, you know. You usually know exactly where you are, down to the GPS coordinates. I’m just surprised.”

 

“Well, you know.” She was walking past Kensington Square Gardens. “Things have been disorienting lately.”

 

Jane snorted. “Why don’t you come home?”

 

“Okay.”

 

“Don’t be so compliant. It doesn’t suit you.”

 

Sherlock hung up, turned around, and headed toward Royal Oak, where she caught the tube back to Baker Street. She hurried up the road, hunching her shoulders against the wind, threw open the door, and climbed the stairs to find Jane waiting in the sitting room with a cup of tea.

 

“I made one for you, too.” She offered Sherlock a steaming mug.

 

Before taking it, Sherlock twisted her hair into a chignon and pulled an elastic off of her wrist to secure it. Hoping to delay their conversation, she said, “I’m thinking about cutting it. What do you think?”

 

“I dunno. I like it long. But it’s up to you.” Jane shrugged.

 

Sherlock took the tea with a trembling hand and sniffed it. “Tetley’s?” She pulled off her coat and sat down across the table from Jane.

 

“Yeah.”

 

“You went to the store.”

 

“I did. Where were you when I got back?”

 

“I went for a walk.”

 

“Oh.” Jane took a sip and flinched from the heat. “That’s not—I guess—well what I mean to say is—oh, fuck it.” She ran her hand through her hair and tugged nervously on the collar of her jumper. It was a different one this afternoon. Sherlock noticed that she’d sent her other one out for cleaning. “So about last night.”

 

Sherlock dug her nails into her leg and squeezed.

 

“I don’t know what it means,” said Jane. Sherlock stared intently at her tea.

 

“You…don’t know?”

 

“I mean, I might be bi. I think I’m bi. I just know that I’m, well—“ she bit her lip. “I know I’m really, desperately, and totally in love with you.”

 

Sherlock couldn’t look her in the eye. “Is that why you kissed me?”

 

“Yeah, that’s why I kissed you.”

 

Sherlock couldn’t breathe. She took up and opened the window to get a bit of air. While she was staring out, she said, “I don’t think you know how long I’ve wanted you to do that.”

 

“Probably about as long as I’ve wanted it.”

 

“Longer.” Sherlock was watching a passing taxi outside. She turned back towards Jane, who was a few metres away. The drizzle slapped the side of her face.

 

Jane took another sip of her tea. Sherlock was struck by the banality of the situation; here they were, she standing, Jane sitting, in their sitting room with the dumb cow skull and the enormous mess they’d left accumulating for far too long, discussing the fact that they’d wanted each other for god knows how long, that they’d been secretly pining away for each other for months without the other knowing it, wondering how and if they’d ever let it out, if they’d ever confess their secrets or if they’d just boil and fester inside of them while Jane dated countless men and Sherlock watched.

 

Jane stood up and walked over to where Sherlock stood, shivering. She wrapped her arms around Sherlock’s waist, tilted her head up, and kissed her. They could feel the drizzle on their faces, but neither cared.

 

“Your tea is getting cold,” said Sherlock.

 

“Screw the tea,” said Jane.

 

“We need to talk about this.”

 

“Fuck me first,” said Jane.

 

“My room or yours?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not suuuuper happy with this chapter but I wanted to get it up :/ Probably will edit later.


	9. Covalent bonds

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock and Jane discuss what comes next; a case is on the horizon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the long time between updates; I found myself a job and am now, for better or for worse, an employed writer of smut. :|

Of course they had sex. It was slower than the first time, which had been quick and brutal, and had gone so fast that they’d barely realised what was happening. This time they paused, pressing their bodies together, taking time to remove their clothes. The ferocity and urgency of their first time was gone. This time, it was Sherlock who pressed her mouth between Jane’s legs first, Jane who moaned and gasped and felt her world shake first.

 

There was no enchantment over them like the first time, but that was what was good about it. It was expected, and mundane for that, but at the same time beautiful for both of them; at least, that’s what Sherlock thought as Jane twitched and panted under her touch. They waited a moment after, grappling with each other in the sheets, since they’d made it to the bed this time, taking time to savour the impact of their flesh and the way their bodies moulded. Then Jane slid beneath the sheets and Sherlock felt her begin to work.

 

This time it took longer, but that was because they paused as they went for kisses and strokes, and because Jane finished her off with her hand.

 

When they were done, they both lay in bed side-by-side, exposed and vulnerable, still quivering. Jane stroked Sherlock’s slender arms with one fingertip that made her shiver, and Sherlock’s thick black hair fanned out over the pillows of Jane’s bed. Jane’s fingertip reached Sherlock’s shoulder and moved up her neck and into her hair, where Jane twisted it around her finger.

 

“Here’s what I have to say,” Jane said, quietly. “I think I’ve sort of loved you from the moment the words ‘Afghanistan or Iraq?’ left your mouth. I think that you’ve been my obsession since we first met. I just never realised it because I never felt the same way about men.” She paused. “There, I’ve said my bit.”

 

Sherlock considered her own bit for a moment, her arm curved over her head, which was turned to the right, looking at Jane. She moved her hand toward Jane and planted her thumb between her breasts, circling her nipples almost like a compass.

 

“I don’t know how long,” she said, finally. “A long time. Probably as long as you, but it was slower than that. It kind of crept up on me.” She stopped.

 

“So where do we go from here?”

 

Neither of them said a word. Jane breathed in heavily and sat up in bed, running a hand through her hair and the bending over to scratch her legs. Sherlock grasped Jane’s free left hand in her right one and laced their fingers together.

 

“This is where we go from here, I think.” She sighed. 

 

“Have you ever been in love before?”

 

“I don’t know if I’m ready to talk about it.”

 

“Will you let me know?”

 

Sherlock didn’t reply, but instead thought about the moment Jane had mentioned and what had preceded it: that offhand remark to Stamford that had sent the two of them on a collision course.

 

-

 

She remembered meeting Jane and being, at first, unimpressed by this tiny military doctor with short hair and a chip on her shoulder. Not that the chip had anything to do with it; she just hadn’t seemed to be anyone remarkable, not in that split second.

 

But then, as their conversation had continued, it hadn’t taken long for Sherlock to get reeled in, for her to walk away with some comment about a riding crop in a mortuary with the distinct realisation that there was something extraordinary about this woman to whom she had just been introduced. There was something in her soft toughness that was paradoxical but enchanting.

 

It had started so simply, waiting to hear Jane call her to set up a time to see the flat, but loving the sound of her voice and sending her multiple texts afterwards just hoping she’d reply. And then they’d been sent cartwheeling through this case, and when they giggled together in the foyer after that cab chase, Sherlock had accepted, cautiously, the idea that Dr Jane Watson might really be able to become her friend.

 

She’d had no idea how Jane felt about her. Her skills at reading body language were better than most, but still highly theoretical and systematic; she had no room for nuance or slight variation or personal tics. She’d had to learn it all herself, not intuitively like most people, and Jane had been so unreadable. Sherlock couldn’t allow herself optimism; couldn’t allow herself to think that perhaps this woman liked her back or maybe she really did enjoy her company. All opinions had to come from cold hard facts, not hopes.

 

She was a beautiful enigma, but one whose approval Sherlock sought without failure from the very first. Even if her cerebrum hadn’t realised it, her limbic system had: this woman was special, and Sherlock had to do everything to pull her in and hold her close because without her she would be lost forever.

 

And then she’d nearly thrown it all away for a cheap thrill, but at the time it hadn’t seemed that way. It was like reflecting on adolescence from one’s early twenties; every decision that seemed reasonable and good at the time is entirely dubious. All the decisions she made that night and everything she did afterwards was questionable. How could she have been so ignorant?

 

-

 

“What are you thinking about?”

 

“Hm?”

 

“Sherlock,” said Jane, “don’t give me that. I know when you’re somewhere else.”

 

Their hands were still tightly interlaced, but Jane was lying back down on the bed.

 

“I—I was just thinking about when we first met. And all the dubious decisions I made that next night.”

 

“Oh.”

 

Sherlock hooked one of her legs around Jane’s to bring them closer.

 

“You’re so cold,” said Jane.

 

“Sorry.”

 

“It’s all right,” she said. “Let me warm you up.”

 

Sherlock exhaled. “How do you feel about France?”

 

“What about it?”

 

“I just got a case in Paris. How do you feel about France?”

 

“For you, I think I could go to France.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so excited to write a chapter in Paris so I'll probably try and get it up asap.


	10. Electron transfer

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock and Jane make their way to Paris.

They booked the Eurostar for six days later the next morning; it wasn’t cheaper than flying, but their client had offered to pay all expenses. Besides, the American TSA could be so squeamish about guns on planes anywhere in the world. Sherlock’s passport was expired, and she had to get premium service so they could book their tickets. All was frantic in 221B. Sherlock left flat-sitting instructions with Mrs Hudson (which consisted essentially of “please use any means possible to chase Mycroft away if he shows up”) and the two of them packed frenziedly in their separate rooms, Jane only pausing as she opened the drawer where she kept a various assortment of birth control.

 

“Do I need any of this!?” she shouted downstairs.

 

“Any of your birth control?!” Sherlock had figured out the subject of the question already.

 

“Yes!”

 

Jane heard thudding on the stairs and Sherlock came through her door. Even though they’d been sharing the room for a week now, Sherlock still hadn’t moved her things due to a combination of laziness and lack of desire for Mycroft to deduce exactly _how_ involved she was with Jane.

 

“I don’t know. What have you got there?”

 

“Diaphragm. Condoms. I guess we should buy dental dams.”

 

“It’s been a week already and just _now_ you’re worrying about safe sex?” Sherlock snorted. “Yes, fine, better safe than sorry, I suppose. You _can_ make dental dams out of condoms, you know.”

 

“I doubt I’ll really have the patience for that.”

 

The corner of Sherlock’s mouth lifted up for a moment, and then she checked her watch.

 

“Shit, the train’s leaving in two hours.”

 

“We have time.”

 

“Not much.”

 

“You’re hardly ever the person trying to stick to the schedule. You must really be keen to start this case.”

 

Sherlock didn’t answer, but turned around and headed back down the stairs to finish her own packing.

 

Fifteen minutes later, Jane dragged her suitcase down one flight of stairs and found Sherlock sitting in her chair, legs bouncing and checking her watch about every thirty seconds.

 

She admired Sherlock from behind for a second and finally asked, “Got everything?”

 

“Yes,” said Sherlock, springing up at the sound of Jane’s voice. Her hand flew to her suitcase, which she hoisted up and dragged haphazardly toward the door, looking back at Jane as if checking to see if she needed any assistance.

 

“You’re absurd,” said Jane. “I can bench 120.”

 

Sherlock blushed, flung the door open and started walking down the stairs. Jane could hear the rhythmic clunking getting further and further away.

 

“I’ll lock the door, shall I?”

 

-

 

The cab dropped them in front of St Pancras, and they ran towards the entrance while Sherlock checked her watch again and shouted, “Forty-five minutes!”

 

The crowds waiting for trains or standing in queues in the shops parted in two to make way for the dark haired woman running past, her coat billowing behind her like a cape. Jane followed, wishing that Sherlock would run faster if this were really so important to her.

 

They threw their suitcases on the x-ray machine and Sherlock fidgeted in the queue, tucking her hair behind her ears and checking regularly to make sure that Jane was still standing behind her.

 

She handed her passport and ticket to the Frenchman behind the screen. He checked the photo against her face, handed her passport back without stamping it, and moved onto Jane, for whom he did the same while Sherlock checked her watch again nervously.

 

“All passengers to Paris on the 11:45 Eurostar, please make your way to the platform now, as it is preparing to leave.”

 

Sherlock sighed and bolted as soon as Jane was ready.  


“Which platform was it?”

 

“They didn’t say!”

 

“Shit.”

 

“All passengers to Paris on the 11:45 Eurostar, please make your way to platform 9 now, as it is preparing to leave.”

 

“This way,” said Sherlock, rounding the corner to the platforms, and sprinting down the quay at full speed while looking at her ticket to check which seats they were in.

 

“We made it,” said Jane pointlessly, as Sherlock screeched to a halt in front carriage 18 and the two of them boarded together.

 

It was a weekday, and not a holiday, so the train was about a quarter empty, and they got a table to themselves. Jane scooted into the seat across so that they could look at each other.

 

“We made it,” she said again, with a slight note of disbelief. Sherlock rubbed her hands together and blew on them. “Cold hands?”

 

“Yeah,” said Sherlock.

 

Jane took Sherlock’s hand between hers and rubbed it. “Better?”

 

“Much,” said Sherlock, giving Jane a peck on the lips while a fifty-something Belgian businessman on the other side of the aisle snorted over his copy of the _Daily Mail._ Disbelief and anger flickered across Jane’s face, but Sherlock shook her head almost imperceptibly to say, _no, don’t do it; he’s not worth it._ Jane sighed and then smirked at him, taking a moment to think about what to do, and then reached across the table to lock wrists with Sherlock while they looked at each other and the train started moving.

 

Sherlock marvelled to herself about how much they’d left unsaid. They’d never set any boundaries about exactly how far they’d be willing to go in public, but somehow there was silent understanding between them about it.

 

Which wasn’t to say that their relationship was perfect. They’d already fought once, about something stupid like Sherlock leaving the milk out (again). It wasn’t like a flatmates’ quarrel anymore either; it was a fully-blown domestic, just like Mrs Hudson always asked about. Something imperceptible had changed since they’d had sex, and for the most part it was good. But the fights were worse, and that, Sherlock supposed, was the trade-off. She would take it.

 

The train picked up speed, and England started whipping past. They got to the Chunnel, and everything plunged into darkness for twenty minutes while they looked at each other through the orange-ish light, and Jane pulled out a copy of _The Silkworm_ with her left hand _,_ keeping her right on Sherlock’s.

 

“Ever been to Paris before?” asked Sherlock.

 

Jane’s eyes tracked to the end of a sentence, and she looked up. “Hm?”

 

“Paris. Ever been?”

 

“Can’t say I have. I took German in school. I’ve been to Munich. You?” They’d been so busy for the past few days that they’d barely had time to think, let alone talk about France.

 

“On holiday, years ago. I was nine. Mycroft tried to leave me at Sacre-Coeur.”

 

“Seems like something he might do.” Jane looked back down at her book and they stayed silent until the carriage lit up again with sunlight, and Jane took a curious glance outside at the green Pas-de-Calais. “So this is France.” Sherlock watched the shadows of trees pass over Jane’s face as they went east. Jane yawned, put her book on the table and shut her eyelids. Her hand went slack in Sherlock’s, but neither let go until they pulled into the Gare-du-Nord.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tbh a better summary would be "they spend the Eurostar ride holding each others' hands" because that's essentially all that this chapter consists of.
> 
> It's also been a while since I rode the Eurostar so if there are any glaring factual errors, I apologize!


	11. Surface area

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock and Jane enjoy some alone time in their hotel room before they meet their client.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Changed the rating from Mature to Explicit because eh why not I know no one's going to be offended. ;) Translations of the French at the bottom.

Their hotel room was four stories up in the seventh arrondissement, and they had a fantastic view of line six out their window. The steel grating contrasted beautifully with the Haussmann apartments around it, and a train passed by in the sleepy afternoon light.

 

Sherlock wasn’t pleased. “How are we supposed to sleep with trains rumbling by all hours of the day?”

 

“I kind of like it.”

 

Their room had one bed that folded up into the wall, and they pulled it down. Jane sat down and asked, “How long do we have until we’re supposed to meet the client?”

 

“Two hours. We’re meeting in the fifth. Some seafood restaurant near _les Gobelins._ ”

 

“Mmmmmm. Do we have to?”

 

Sherlock sat next to her on the bed and ran a hand through Jane’s hair. “Yes.” The light was bluer than it was in London, and they were slower to get at it, taking a moment to savour their surroundings. Sherlock threw the curtains open so that they could see the tracks out their window, and if they looked down, the passers-by going in and out of the station.

 

“Open the window,” said Jane. Sherlock unlatched it, and the roar of the city blasted into the room and set the curtains aflutter. Jane leaned back on the duvet, still fully clothed. Sherlock slid two fingers to Jane’s fly and unbuttoned it, shimmying the trousers down to Jane’s knees. She hooked her index finger around Jane’s knickers and pulled those down, too, kneeling at the foot of the bed. Jane kicked both garments off, and Sherlock slowly slid one finger into her. Jane trembled.

 

“Wait.” She pulled off her jumper with two hands, balled it up, and threw it to the side. Underneath she was wearing a plaid collared shirt, which Sherlock helped her unbutton. “Now.”

 

Sherlock started again, one finger, two fingers, three fingers—

 

“No fisting,” said Jane quietly. Sherlock grunted in acknowledgement and started stroking other parts between Jane’s labia while Jane sighed and twitched and her hips jerked. Sherlock felt herself getting wet in her pants, but kept going, pinching Jane’s clit, squeezing it while Jane grunted and Sherlock felt more gushing in her knickers. She began tapping aggressively, building up the pressure while the two of them panted in unison and another train whooshed by. Someone down on the street shouted in Bengali—or at least Sherlock thought it was Bengali, she was rather paying more attention to Jane—Jane balled one hand into a fist and started pounding the bed.

 

“I’m coming, I’m coming, I’m coming…”

 

Sherlock lowered her mouth down to Jane’s vulva and started licking forcefully. Jane gave one twitch and gasped. “Oh, _fuck me!”_

 

“I just did,” said Sherlock, mildly confused.

 

“I meant it in a—“ she panted, “—figurative sense.” She sat up. “Okay, trousers off.”

 

Sherlock stood and obliged, and Jane nearly ripped off Sherlock’s pants in a frenzied attempt to get her naked. She stayed standing while Jane plunged her face into Sherlock’s mass of curly brown hair, but her legs quickly buckled and she lowered herself onto the bed.

 

“You know we really—“ gasp “—ought to get ourselves—“ gasp “a strap-on or—“ gasp “—something.”

 

“Shmp umph,” said Jane, which Sherlock decoded as _shut up._ She felt heat spreading from her pelvis up to her chest in pleasant waves, like a kind of fire climbing up her body, warming her from the inside. Jane kept at it, probing every inch of Sherlock, insides, outsides, betweens, unders. Sherlock closed her eyes and let herself get carried away by the roaring she could hear in the back of her ears and the waves of heat that were travelling up her body.

 

She felt herself inching closer and closer to that moment where everything would explode, as her brain cranked to a halt, just for the one moment while Jane was probing inside of her, while she felt her nipples and clit grow erect, while she could feel every sensation, and everything started prickling and she could feel it building in every cubic inch of her body from her fingers to her toes and—

 

“Ohhhhhhh.”

 

“We could try scissoring,” said Jane, grinning.

 

-

 

They were dressed again, these two Englishwomen in Paris grinning at each other and lacing fingers together while they swiped the NaviGos they’d bought at the Gare du Nord and tugged each other through the gates to the metro at La Motte Piquet-Grenelle.

 

“Eleven stations,” said Sherlock as they sat down and Jane plopped her head gently on Sherlock’s shoulder. Sherlock closed her eyes and inhaled the scent of Jane’s hair while she thought she heard someone mutter “des gouines anglaises.” Sherlock cracked open one eye long enough to locate the perpetrator, lock eyes with him, and mutter “ta gueule!” Jane, who didn’t speak French, snuggled closer to her while an electronic voice called the name of the station.

 

“How do you like Paris so far?”

 

Jane didn’t open her eyes, but murmured, “It’s pretty good so far.”

 

“I’m liking it a lot better myself.”

 

Jane chuckled and the train screeched to a halt again. “I promise _I_ won’t try to leave you behind at Sacre Coeur.” She paused as if she were thinking. “Well, unless I find someone cuter.” She giggled.

 

Sherlock laughed. “That won’t be very hard. ‘Cute’ is the one word no one’s _ever_ used to describe me, except maybe as an infant.”

 

Jane snorted. “Are you kidding me? You’re adorable. You try and make people think you’re some dark princess of the night, but you’re really just a cute little softie.” She flicked Sherlock’s nose, and Sherlock flinched. Jane laughed again.

 

Sherlock said nothing, and instead slid her hand over to Jane’s and started stroking her fingers gently. They stayed like that for a few minutes, watching the stations flicker past. Sherlock pulled out her phone and started fiddling with it.

 

“Next one’s ours,” said Sherlock finally. They stood up and started towards the exit, hands still locked. The doors whooshed open and they stepped onto the platform. “Just a short walk from here.”

 

They climbed the stairs into the six-o’clock light. It was summer, and Paris was still light. The streetlamps weren’t even illuminated. Jane raised her eyebrows and her eyes skated over the trees in the square.

 

“This way.” Sherlock pointed toward the Avenue des Gobelins, and they started marching in time past evenly spaced trees and uniform apartments.

 

“You’re really a fish out of water here, aren’t you?” asked Jane.

 

“What do you mean?”

 

“Don’t play dumb, I saw you checking Google maps on your phone.”

 

Sherlock huffed.

 

“I won’t tell anyone,” said Jane, with a huge grin spreading across her face. She looked up into Sherlock’s angular face, with its beautiful green-blue eyes, and added, “dear god, do I love you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> gouines anglaises - English dykes
> 
> ta gueule - shut the fuck up


	12. Volatile compounds

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Flashback.

**Six Months Earlier**

It hadn’t been a good day. There were a million frustrations squeezing into Sherlock’s headspace, pushing out the important things and making her distracted and fuzzy. First there was this flat she needed to find someone else to go in on, then there was Victoria being obnoxious and sending her incessant emails ( _a clean break, that’s what I need_ ), dealers who still had her number and wanted to give her a fix, who didn’t respect that she was clean now. Skivvy bastards.

 

Should she change her nu—no, no, no. Focus, Sherlock.

 

But then something happened to truly blow her world apart. The door opened and two women stepped into the laboratory. “Bit different from my day,” she heard one of them mutter.

 

“Mattie, can I borrow your phone? There’s no signal on mine.”

 

Mattie Stamford shrugged her shoulders and her eyes flicked toward the ceiling. “Sorry, left it in my coat.”

 

“Here, have mine,” said the second woman, who offered it to Sherlock.

 

Who was this? A doctor, clearly. She’d studied at Bart’s. Military, from the way she held herself. Tanned, injured abroad.

 

“Afghanistan or Iraq?” Sherlock asked, flicking the phone open.

 

“Sorry?”

 

That was how it started, how she fell in love with this beautiful woman. It wasn’t love at first sight. Rather, it was love at a thousand glances that began from the moment Jane opened her mouth. It was a gentle ride, getting a little push to start out but then picking up speed and going faster until she was out of control. Until she couldn’t check her speed or her course or anything of that anymore. She was being carried away on the tide of _Jane_ and nothing in the world could make her happier.

 

Of course, she only figured this out in retrospect. For the first two months, until that February day, it was so hazy and unclear; was it platonic love? Desire? Fantasy?

 

It was so unlike what she’d had with Vicky, where Vicky had taken the lead and snapped Sherlock up in her uncontrollable lust, where they were fucking three days after they’d met at some party in the city and it had never been about anything but _sex_ and _snogging._ Vicky was practiced; she’d shagged girls in the toilets at her college, touched a dozen vaginas and heard a hundred gasps. Sherlock had been the next in a long line, and

Vicky knew exactly what she wanted from Sherlock. They’d not been friends, not really. Just lovers.

 

Twenty-six, and still like a college kid in so many ways.

 

Meeting Jane was terrifying, because suddenly Sherlock needed her more than anything. _Don’t get involved,_ Mycroft had always said. Jane was a danger junkie, a masterwork of recklessness who truly enjoyed thrills and who could so easily disappear in so many different ways. She could fall in love, get married, die. And then Sherlock would be gone again.

 

Caring about someone was dangerous. Jane figured that out, too, the moment she pulled the trigger on the gun that night. _I care about you._

_I love you._

Whose words were they, embedded in those precious moments, sneaking into their brains like alien thoughts? They stared at each other, stared at Mycroft, and those words rang and echoed in their separate skulls like someone else had put them there. _I love you._

 

Sherlock, at least, had buried them deep, had paid no heed. This wasn’t what love felt like, not for her. Love was thirst, wild nights in the sheets, violent kisses. She wanted none of that from Jane. It was something different, not love. The question never even posed itself.

 

They got Chinese food together and Sherlock guessed the fortune cookies, tapping Jane’s knuckles in a surprisingly intimate way while her mouth was half-full with kung pao chicken.

 

“Mmm.” She swallowed. “Yours, _you will be successful in love._ ”

 

“You’re shitting me.”

 

“Open it.” She was right.

 

“What about yours? No way you can go two for two.”

 

“Try me. _Land is always on the mind of a flying bird._ I’m always right.”

 

She bust open the cookie with a smirk on her face and stretched out the strip of paper. Her face fell.

 

“Ha! You were wrong! Read it aloud.”

 

“ _You will be successful in love.”_

Jane snorted. “ _You? Successful in love_? I guess that means you’ll solve some good cases this week. Married to your work, aren’t you?”

 

Sherlock chuckled. “Yes. Married indeed. We could hold a ceremony.”

 

“That would be extraordinary narcissistic, even for you.”

 

Sherlock pouted. Jane reached across the table and gave her a flick on the shoulder.

 

“Hey. I’m just taking the piss, you dummy.”

 

-

 

The next morning, they woke up in the flat and neither of them could quite believe what had transpired the night before. Murder, mayhem, Sherlock’s recklessness, Jane’s even bolder risk-taking, a dead cabbie. And a solution. Their first case. Over.

 

Jane pulled on her jumper and thumped down the stairs to find Sherlock sipping coffee and looking over her blog.

 

Her face said that she was begging to say something. “Are you going to take me on any more cases?” Jane sidled over to the kitchen and popped two pieces of bread in the toaster.

 

Sherlock blinked. “Hm?”

 

“I said, are you going to take me on any more cases?”

 

Her brow furrowed. “Why on earth would I take you on any _more_ cases? The last one ended disastrously enough, didn’t it?” The words were vicious, intended to scare Jane off. She didn’t really want to come on cases, did she? It was some stupid pity thing. Maybe she’d lied about taking Mycroft’s money. Maybe she really was getting paid off.

 

“I liked it.”

 

Sherlock blinked again and looked back at her blog. The toast popped.

 

Jane raised her voice. “I _said,_ I liked it.”

 

“Well, if you truly insist.” Her eyes flicked toward the kitchen, where Jane was standing.

 

“I do.” Jane took the toast out and began buttering it. “I think you need me along to make sure you don’t end up dead.”

 

“I got along for twenty-six years of my life without you; I think I can manage another couple of cases.” Sherlock rolled her eyes as if brushing off the idea of a companion, but was inwardly somewhat stunned by the familiarity in her own voice, as if they’d known each other for years, as if she were speaking to Vicky rather than this woman she’d only known for two days. For all Jane knew, Sherlock _could_ be a serial killer. “But if you do really insist.”

 

Jane plopped herself down opposite Sherlock and started munching on her toast. “You _need_ me along. You’re an idiot.”


	13. Saturation points

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Our girls get a little more adventurous in the sex-toy arena.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I mean basically just more porn who am I kidding anymore
> 
> Translations of the French in the endnotes.

It had been so long, and yet such a short time—a disorientingly short time. 

There was something about sex four stories up that made Sherlock lose her breath and train of thought. It might have been the blue and yellow light of the Paris dawn, or the trains still rushing by and rustling the curtains, or the sound of everyone’s weekday commute, the bustle of the city while she and John remained suspended outside of the daily routine, two Londoners on a (sort of) working holiday. 

They actually had stopped by The Dollhouse the day before, like Jane had suggested, and bought a strap-on. Both of them were embarrassingly sex-toy illiterate, and had stood flushed in front of the rack of dildos, flicking, poking, and squeezing them with occasional glances toward the other. Tori had always been in charge of that kind of thing; Sherlock had been the baby gay between the two of them, and they’d just done it without much discussion of logistics. Jane had only ever been with men.

“I’ve used a vibrator before,” she’d offered helpfully, breaking the silence.

“Okay,” Sherlock had said, unsure of how to respond. 

“Je peux vous aider?” there was a sultry voice behind them that made Jane blink. 

“Ah, on cherche, ah, on cherche—“ Sherlock grimaced. She’d never bothered to learn the word for ‘dildo’ in college French class. 

“Vous êtes en couple?” 

“Ouais.” 

“Alors, je veux propose un magnum,” the saleswoman had said, clacking her nails together, which made Sherlock wince. She indicated a purple dildo that looked simple enough. “Au niveau des harnais, vous avez le choix mais je vous recommande le jaguar, c’est mon préféré.” 

“Okay.” 

“What was that about?” Jane had asked. 

“She told us to take this one,” said Sherlock, taking the magnum in her hand and giving it a firm squeeze. “And this,” she said, hooking a jaguar harness around her wrist. 

“Well,” Jane had said, “she’d better be right. This’ll put us back at least a hundred pounds.” 

She had been right. Later in the hotel room, Sherlock, used to receiving with Tori, had offered the ensemble to Jane, who’d refused and told Sherlock to “go on ahead.” Sherlock had, after a moment of bafflement, adjusted the straps and hooked in the dildo, relishing the pressure against her own clit, just the barest bit of stimulation. She placed her hands on her bony hips and relished the look of her small dick. She’d never tried one on before. She definitely liked it. 

“Lie down on the bed,” said Jane, not one to be easily distracted. Sherlock obliged and Jane took a moment to admire her lover before she slid herself onto the bed and Sherlock’s hand slipped slowly toward Jane’s vagina, rubbing her hard and fast to make Jane moan. 

“That’s it, that’s it,” she said with some huskiness to her voice. Sherlock felt her growing wet. Jane moaned in approval and lowered herself gently onto Sherlock, rocking back and forth lightly at first, riding her, going faster and harder as she got wider and slicker, her features slack and her eyelids closed. She grunted. 

It was different from how they’d had sex before, maybe because they were both so in the moment, both experiencing the same thing. They were both lost in the curves and folds of each other’s bodies, no taking turns, just the two of them, ecstatically adrift. 

Sherlock felt her own vagina growing extremely damp beneath the dildo, noticed the beginning of slow burn pressure, nowhere near coming yet, just a tingling and relaxation throughout her body, concentrated down at her waist. Every motion Jane made sent little electric shocks through her body that made her twitch a bit and gasp aloud. Jane grew more rhythmic, and her hand slid down between her own legs, just to give that one final stroke that would send her over the edge. 

“Oh!” Her eyes rolled back and she exhaled deeply and forcefully, exploding into motion on Sherlock, riding the orgasm to completion. “You there yet?” Sherlock shook her head. “This helping?” Sherlock grunted affirmatively, reaching a hand up hypnotically to stroke Jane’s nipple, closing her own eyes and sitting back as Jane continued and Sherlock began to feel the beginnings of an orgasm creeping up her chest, sending little bits of fire up her sides and smothering her with an incredible want for this woman who was riding her cock with a look of absolute bliss, delighting in the sounds and smells of Jane Jane Jane, and the feeling of Jane pushing her gently towards coming, she was so close now. 

Jane starting going more slowly, a mischievous glint in her eye, almost grinding to a halt as Sherlock felt herself on the edge of exploding. She wanted to scream oh god you beautiful woman, bless you for knowing what I like but her brain was nowhere capable of forming English sentences, it was all empty and full of nothing but Jane. The pressure ended, her body lit up and the first wave rolled through and up her and she screamed, half hoping she hadn’t woken the neighbours and half hoping that all of Paris had heard Jane Watson give her the best orgasm of her life. 

She undid the straps and gasped for air, tossing it to the side. Jane shimmied up to her and started stroking her breasts, drawing patterns around her nipples. 

Sherlock’s phone rang. It was the client.   
“Fuck.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Can I help you?" 
> 
> "Um, we're looking for, um, we're looking for..."
> 
> "Are you guys a couple?" 
> 
> "Yes." 
> 
> "Okay, I'd recommend a magnum. As far as harnesses go, you've got a good choice but I recommend the jaguar, that's my favorite."


	14. Compounds

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A resolution to a case, a hopeful start to something great.

Sherlock sat down on the pavement in the rue de Tolbiac and heaved a gigantic breath.

 

“Holy shit.” Her head snapped over to look at John, who was standing next to her, gaping at the swarm of police who had descended on the Quartier de la Gare. It was barely dusk, and darkness was just barely beginning to fall but Sherlock could watch the bright red and blue lights flicker on and off of Jane's skin, and diffuse through the mist of her breath. _Wee-oo wee-oo._

 

Sherlock rummaged around in her coat and, happily, came up with a solitary, stale cigarette, which she lit with a purple lighter in her breast pocket.

 

John jutted out her lip but said nothing.

 

“I should give myself a reward for solving the case,” said Sherlock.

 

“Well, maybe I would have fucked you, if you weren’t going to smell like an ashtray.” She didn’t sound cross, despite her words. Jane put one hand in her pocket and shifted her weight to one leg, the “good” one. (They were both good, but the left had made it through the war uninjured.) “Quite the police presence.”

 

“Well, that tends to happen when one busts a child-trafficking ring wide open.”

 

Jane shuddered. “I don’t want to think about it that way.”

 

Sherlock took another drag. “Well, that’s what it is.”

 

“I just don’t want to think about it.”

 

“Fine.” The lights caught the opaque smoke from Sherlock’s cigarette, and it flashed in the lights.

 

“I can’t believe no one noticed.”

 

“People only see what they want to see,” said Sherlock, stubbing out the cigarette on the pavement. She stood up and flicked the butt into a nearby bush and shrugged at Jane's furrowed eyebrows. “No, truly. People will go to such lengths to ignore that which doesn’t fit into their prescribed worldview. And most people’s prescribed worldview says that there should not be a child-trafficking ring in a respectable part of the _treizième_ , let alone that the police should be involved, or that the disappearance of a distant relation of a man of actual means might provoke him to hire the foremost private investigator in Europe.”

 

“Still. There must have been signs.”

 

“Have you been listening to me?”

 

Jane sneered and turned away.

 

Sherlock sighed and set her jaw. “I’m sorry.”

 

“Do you understand why this is upsetting?”

 

Sherlock took a deep breath and paused. “Intellectually, yes.” She stopped. “Emotionally, yes. Actually.” She glanced around and bit her lip. “Look, Jane. I’m sorry. It’s hard. I can’t do this if I’m not detached. I have to cut myself off from _feeling_ things about these victims because then I can’t work to save them. I’m sorry if I seem, well, _callous._ I’m sorry.”

 

Jane swallowed and looked up at Sherlock.

 

“Do you really mean that?”

 

Sherlock ran a hand through her hair. “Don’t tell anyone.”

 

“I’ll take that as a yes.”

 

The two of them looked at each other for a moment. “I think our work here is done,” said Sherlock. “Something tells me that there will be no medal of honor in this for me.”

 

“No, I don’t think so,” said Jane. “Think of the headlines.”

 

“I don’t know if there will be any headlines. We don’t know much about it. Who knows what they’ll tell the press? Who knows if they’ll tell the press _anything?_ ” There was an edge in Sherlock’s voice, and Jane didn’t keep on her.

 

It was dark by then, and Sherlock took one look back at the police cars before snatching Jane's hand and pulling her down into the Olympiades metro station.

 

-

 

They left Paris the next morning on the first train to London, with a new sex toys packed away deep inside their luggage, and without the packet of cigarettes that John had tossed into the first bin she saw in at the Gare du Nord. Their patron, the man who had paid for them to come and look for his niece had paid Sherlock handsomely for their discretion, and John sported a new pair of pearl earrings (against which she had protested, but Sherlock knew Jane's taste).

 

Jane slept and Sherlock checked her blog for new cases, but flicked past the first few.

 

“Boring,” she whispered. “Boring. 6/10. Boring.” Jane grunted and Sherlock fell silent.

 

Sherlock looked at Jane with a soppy smile on her face, and dropped her head to rest on Jane's shoulder. She sighed and locked her phone without deciding on her next case. Jane shifted to pull Sherlock closer and sighed contentedly. Sherlock did not notice when she dropped off to sleep.

 

“ _Mesdames et messieurs, nous arrivons bientôt à notre destination de Londres St Pancras. Veuilliez ne pas oublier vos bagages.”_

Jane stirred first, stretched, and yawned, accidentally pushing Sherlock’s head off of her shoulder.

 

“Ow.”

 

“Sorry.”

 

“Five more minutes.”

 

“Sorry babe, we’re here,” said Jane.

 

“Where here,” said Sherlock, eyes still closed, face still relaxed. Her eyes flickered open. “Are we in London already?”

 

“Afraid so.”

 

“No, I’m glad,” she said, shrugging on her coat and standing up. “I’ve had enough of Paris, honestly. That case was draining.” Jane shuddered, which caught Sherlock’s eye. Sherlock fixed her in the eye and said, “I’m sorry you’re so affected. Truly.”

 

“Don’t be sorry,” said Jane, staring back at her. “We do the most extraordinary work and I wouldn’t trade it for the world. It’s just…sometimes we can’t save them all.”

 

“That we can’t,” agreed Sherlock, passing into the corridor to pull their suitcases from the rack. Jane's was small and black, and buried at the bottom was her bullet vibrator and their more recent purchases. Jane looked at it for a moment and snickered. “Try to be a grown-up here.”

 

“Sorry,” she said. Sherlock smirked. The train halted and Jane stumbled a step before Sherlock grabbed her by the scruff of the neck. “Ouch, a little rough!” said Jane.

 

“Sorry.”

 

“It’s fine, I’m okay.” She brushed off her shoulders, although there was nothing lodged there, and stepped down onto the platform. Sherlock followed her closely and Jane clasped her hand.

 

“It’s good to be back in London,” said Jane, surveying their surroundings. Sherlock nodded and gave Jane's hand a squeeze.

 

“I thought you were more of a country girl.”

 

“Oh, but I can appreciate the city,” said Jane, smiling at the corner of her mouth. Her eyes twinkled as she looked at her girlfriend.

 

Sherlock’s face cracked into a toothy smile and she bit her lip. She leaned down, pressed her lips to Jane's, and sighed contentedly. “I never thought I’d be allowed to do this.”

 

“Nor did I,” said Jane, smiling in kind. “Well, I guess we’d better get a move-on,” she said, watching the tourists flocking towards the tapis-roulant.

 

“I guess we’d better,” said Sherlock, as Jane pulled her behind, their hands clasped, squeezing each other tight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! I'm sorry I let this hang around unfinished for so long!


End file.
